I would suggest to you that representative democracy is a sham.

[originalpckelly]

I will never be tricked into believing some total stranger cares as much or more about my welfare than I do.

We have come to the point, in our nation, where the idea of representative democracy is just absurd as the virtual representation the 13 Colonies had in the House of Commons, before the various conflicts that occurred on our nation's path to independence.

We see the Democrats in Congress completely ignore the demands of their voters. It has come too far to go back now. The solution to our problems is not through an election, but some type of sea change outside the traditional framework of politics. It must be a revolution in our minds. Each and every one of us must declare our independence individually, if as a whole we are to be truly free.

Obviously protests do not work, they are pleas to the very people who don't give a fuck about us.

We must change this world ourselves.

[John Q. Citizen]

1. A democratic constitutional republic doesn't fare too well under empire.

We have 'managed representational democracy lite.' And the trend is going the wrong direction, IMHO.

[originalpckelly]

4. It is absurd to suggest that anyone cares about you as much as you do.

The only situation where that might not be true, is a suicidal person.

[John Q. Citizen]

30. Do they care if I get the red sports car I always wanted? No. Do they care that

things run smoothly and want to see a good environment , a good public commons, decent schools? Sure. Don't you? Or if you were elected would you give a shit?

It's absurd to think that humans aren't social animals and that one can live as an island apart from the rest of humanity. Is that where you are going with this?

[originalpckelly]

37. Why do they care about those things? They want them for themselves...

I don't honestly believe they could give a shit about anyone else, or at the very least, we cannot count on that. Our system, though flawed, does take into account the worst motivations in humanity, not the best, because in a situation where the fuckers don't care about us, there'd be no recourse. It's called checks and balances, we're not naive and reliant upon people in power to simply be good little boys and girls, there are structural elements of our system that prevent them from being bad.

The problem, however, is that despite the various checks and balances, there is a fundamental flaw in the idea of representative government. Representatives are always subject to bribery (as we have seen with lobbyists), extortion, and then there's the whole fact that most of these people are self-interested twerps who don't give a fuck about us until we get uppity and threaten their offices. Unfortunately, this system only serves to force them to appease us or make it look like they're doing the right thing, while in secret, or maybe not so secret, they're completely fucking us over.

It is most undemocratic to assume that 535 people can know what's best for us. They don't know me, you, or any of us well enough. We may have met them once or twice, or even worked for them, but beyond that it's not much. This is a simple numbers game, and the numbers are stacked against representative government and in favor of democracy.

[muriel_volestrangler]

2. Just the US's representative democracy, or all of them?

If the very concept is what give you problems, then we have to ask: what do you want instead?

"Declaring independence" from democracy will involve going to some form of anarchy - socialist or libertarian, I presume.

[redqueen]

6. I'm betting they mean just here...

just this system where we're forced to choose between one of two parties... and even those are routinely bribed.

[originalpckelly]

12. No, inherent in the idea of all representative government...

is the possibility of corruption on the part of representatives, it would be nearly impossible to bribe everyone in a full fledged democracy.

[muriel_volestrangler]

42. If you shrink the size of your country to one in which everyone can legislate directly

Then you're looking at a very small country. How big do you think it could be - 50,000, perhaps? At that size, the safety net of a modern government (benefits for those who are poor, a wide base of people and expertise for projects) really isn't there. One town can easily get problems - the major industry goes belly up, for instance - and then those people are screwed, if there's no-one outside the town who'll form a tax base to keep them going.

The question of relations with other countries could also get complicated. Environmental issues are bad enough already, but when nearly everywhere is upstream or downstream of another country, who adjudicates on the questions about keeping the environment clean? Can a country decide its immigration policy - can it keep out people from the next town, just because it feels like it? In a direct democracy, it would have to be able to - if the population vote on something about tehir country, they get it. Countries are already a significant barrier to movement - if we had maybe 100 times as many countries than we do now, the ability of individuals to find a place and job that suits them could be very restricted.

[originalpckelly]

7. "Representative democracy" is like FOX News being "Fair and Balanced"

Democracy is rule by the people, while representative government is rule by representatives of the people.

It's impossible to have representative democracy, either it's democracy or representative government.

I tend to think the idea of representation is a sham, and I point to our history as the prime evidence of that sham.

[Spider Jerusalem]

15. Direct democracy is unworkable in a large society.

It would lead to anarchy.

The ides that something other than a representational form of government would work beyond a commune or small town setting (as in New England) is just unrealistic.

[originalpckelly]

17. Is it really impossible to divide power enough so that we end up with small jurisdictions?

I'd suggest that it start with cities decentralizing power. It should be done in a test city, to see if it works or if it creates even more horrors than representative government.

[Spider Jerusalem]

18. Yes, it's really impossible.

Because you have to have representational government, at some level. Unless you want something like pre-unification (Garibaldi/Bismarck era, this is) Italy and Germany, if not something much worse; the idea of decentralising, and fragmenting a nation into a thousand, or ten thousand, small local enclaves, each of which has an increased reason for animosity towards its neighbours because of perceived political difference, is NOT a good idea.

[originalpckelly]

20. Aren't we kind of doing that in a representative democracy?

[Spider Jerusalem]

21. Not so much, no...

not when there's a single national government, and a single national identity (you DO think of yourself as being an American, no?)

[originalpckelly]

23. Nice way to play to nationalist rhetoric, Hitler.

:P

But how does that help us? If someone is nationalistic and goes off to fight in x-country-with-a-weird-name-they-have-never-heard-of-before and gets killed, is that any better than fighting someone next door? Come on, I mean really, those assholes stole my fucking stapler! Moved me away from the window where I could see the squirrels, and they were merry squirrels too.

But really, these things happen in big governments too, I'd suggest they're even more likely, and when they do happen, they end up killing more people, because more can be drafted into some stupid war. At least in a patchwork nation, there is another place to move to that will likely not be at war.

And when the people realize how fucking stupid they've been to support a war, there will be a much easier ability to change policy in a small area.

[Spider Jerusalem]

25. Sorry, you lose

see: Godwin's Law

(and the idea of a shared identity is a good thing, because it can unite people across ethnic and social lines...we're NOT at a point where we've matured enough as a species and moved enough past tribalism to accept 'human' as that shared identity; hard to totally eradicate the results of seven million years of primate evolution)

[originalpckelly]

26. Actually, I did it on purpose. I'm capable of this thing called sarcasm and humor...

I see they left that out of your programming, Stalin.

[Spider Jerusalem]

27. Doesn't convey well in a text-based environment

and if you can't have a serious discussion, then there's no point in continuing.

[lonestarnot]

16. And the Constitution was supposed to protect against tyranny of the majority but they tore the

fucking thing up and tosssed it in the "just a gd piece of paper" pile.

[originalpckelly]

19. I personally believe that US Americans...

do not have copies of the US American Constitution, and therefore do not know what it says. I think that if we gave US Americans copies of the US American Constitution, they might have a clue.

No, but seriously, it's a flawed government, because it relies upon representation.

Also, the fact that our laws must take into account tons of cases, they are overly complex and difficult for the people to understand. If laws apply to fewer people, the probability of rare cases goes down, laws may be simpler, thusly more understandable and better understood by the populace.

[Sarah Ibarruri]

3. Europe has representatives. I mean how would a govt. work if everyone had to show up in a field to

vote???

[originalpckelly]

11. It is impossible to bribe all of us, it is always inherently a possibility with representatives.

You assume that we would have that much to vote about. The US Congress must at least attempt to satisfy 300,000,000 people with a body of only 535 individuals. I think it stands to reason that they'd have to be in session fairly frequently.

State governments do not traditionally meet every day of the year (or the vast majority). That is because they have less work to do than the federal government, they must only respond to the concerns of a slice of 300,000,000 people, not the entire group.

I suggest that it should be possible to shrink the jurisdiction of a government until the level of work needed to make laws that are efficient and responsive is not significant enough in our daily lives to require representation.

[Sarah Ibarruri]

22. SHRINK government? Now where have I heard that before? LOL! nt

[originalpckelly]

24. Shrink jurisdiction, in the sense of same services provided on a more local level.

Instead of providing the current services at the federal level, provide them at the local level.

[Sarah Ibarruri]

28. I don't agree. I'm not a Federalist, as you can see. nt

[originalpckelly]

29. Err, what? I'd suggest that these are anti-Federalist ideas.

[Sarah Ibarruri]

33. Huh? How are they anti-federalist? nt

[originalpckelly]

34. What? You said Federalist, not federalist.

There is a difference.

[Sarah Ibarruri]

35. Yeah ok, use the cap. nt

[originalpckelly]

36. OK, then they're anti-Federalist ideas...

Remember, the Federalists wanted a strong central government, not the opposite. The anti-Federalists worried about an elected aristocracy, and in particular that the President would become an elected monarchy. That is what I imply by my criticism of "representative" government, as it is really an elected aristocracy. You may even call it an oligarchy, which it is as well.

[Sarah Ibarruri]

40. That's a trick

The trick consists of throwing anything that would benefit the population at large, or the most helpless individuals at the mercy of individual states (which of course work with little funds), while the things that will enrich the rich, remain at the control of the federal government. I've never bought that "keep it at the little level" bs argument. That's a typical right wing Republican argument.

[TheWatcher]

38. Perhaps the votes might actually COUNT.

[Sarah Ibarruri]

41. I agree that we need to remove the electoral college and the delegate crap.....

.... but you still need representatives, or you'd have a jungle chaos. How the hell would you have any laws without a government? You wouldn't. It'd be each one out for himself.

[VP505]

5. I am having some serious

doubts myself that anyone elected really represents any of us. The last few years so many of us have worked hard trying to convey our thoughts to our so called Reps and Senators and yet the prevailing attitude seems to be that we are like small children to be seen and not heard.

[Echo In Light]

8. Check out kpete's thread on the NWO

[onenote]

9. what do propose to replace it?

[originalpckelly]

14. I don't really have all the answers, but I suppose we could try to have little local governments...

that have drastically more power. It might be possible to set up a system of checks and balances between these local governments, so that they would not become corrupt and abuse their people. In other words, ensure the regularity of the application of laws applying to malum in se crimes, the rights of people to move between the governments and the other basic human rights needed to survive day to day.

[jeanruss]

10. I agree

Look at how we have been cheated. We are now forced to choose between two warmonger candidates. The main goal for this election apparently, was to keep the war going regardless of who the candidates are. I find it disgusting that with our tax dollars the government is murdering, raping, torturing and stealing, yet most Americans are all revved up for a football game. I don't feel very good about millions of my fellow citizens right now. I am appalled that this situation doesn't bother them.

[originalpckelly]

13. It does bother them, but individually we are powerless in a mass of 300,000,000 people.

If this country were carved up into much smaller chunks, our importance would be greater, and it would be possible for an individual to effect change upon their society, thusly controlling their destiny.

[John Q. Citizen]

31. Go for it. Good luck. You might end up with a lot of other countries deciding they wanted your

water, land etc. And since you wouldn't want to allie with another country, so as to remain small, you would cease to exist.

You may not have noticed what has happened in the last 20,000 years or so, but human groupings have gotten larger and more complex.

As hunter gatherers, we lived in small groups of humans 20, 50, 100, as soon as we learned horticulture we got larger and more complex.

Agriculture led to cities, because we had a food supply to feed people. Larger and more complex.

Industrial stage led to even larger and more complex units, so that now we have largewr countries with more inhabitants than ever before.

How do you propose we go back to being hunter gatherers?

[originalpckelly]

32. I've had some of the oddest replies in this thread.

It's a massive jump to go from saying that we might possibly consider, if we really like it, the idea of New England style town hall meetings in all of America and the other more participatory forms of government available, and saying that we should disband civilization and return to hunter gatherers.

:P

Gotta love it!

[John Q. Citizen]

39. How do you have a town hall meeting in LA? or NYC? My point is that the

while townhall meetings work in towns, most of humanity lives in population dense urban areas. For the first time in human history, worldwide, more people now live in cities than in the countryside. This is a trend that has been going on forever.

I don't understand how you would propose to go from B to A so to speak.

New England town Hall meetings still employ representive government. If the state says there's a sales tax, as voted on by the state legislature, composed of representitives, then the town meeting can't reverse that.

Many places I know of have neighborhood associations, even in urban areas. But that doesn't preclude representitive government.

You can always call a meeting of your neighbors and start taking and hold a direct democracy vote on any issue that people are interested in, but that doesn't disolve the existing politcal structure.

Or maybe I don't understand what you are saying?

[originalpckelly]

46. You subdivide the city into administrative districts...

based upon the population size of the district. They meet in their local neighborhood where they live, and make decisions about parks/streets/etc.

[Boojatta]

49. Town hall meetings are representative democracy rather than direct democracy.

What if all legislation were enacted via referendums rather than voting by representatives?

[Lars39]

43. Here's an ad that came up with your thread:

Federal Whistleblower
You can report companies that cheat our government. Get the facts today
GovernmentFraud.us

I don't know whether to laugh or cry some days. :think:

[originalpckelly]

47. Can we report Bush and the Congress?

:shrug:

[leftofthedial]

44. then what do you suggest

if only you can be trusted by you to care about your welfare, how will government work?

or are you proposing some sort of radical libertarian anarchy?


although I do agree that our current "government" is a sham. Virtually all elected members of both parties are in the employ of corporations to further corporate interests to the exclusion of all else.

[dysfunctional press]

45. still too many people doing too well to successfully foment a revolution...

maybe someday, though.

[Zynx]

48. No better system has been divised and until one is I will support it.